mur-c-mi

the middle 2

i had to quickly leave starbucks yesterday before i burst into tears. i saw the front page of the New York times which had a picture of a neighborhood in Beirut that had been leveled. that poor city at war again. all week its been all i can do to keep my composure as the devastation increases. i'm also daily getting emails from my friend in Israel. she describes daily life now since this war started which includes frequent dashes to bomb shelters. honestly, i can't help but compare these experiences to the pictures of dead babies in the streets of southern Lebanon.

in this midst of all this i'm a bit ashamed that i'm so off balance with this crisis. there is so much other devastation in the world right now - the Sudan, Congo (really most of the African interior) Indonesia, not to mention Iraq. in the last few years in the congo alone more people have been killed(let alone those that survived their attacks) than the population of Portland and surrounding areas. clearly, there is no shortage of unrest, corruption, genocide, and exploitation in the world this very moment.

anyway, my friend Jody who got back from Beirut 48 hours before Israel began bombing, finally heard back from some of her new friends living there. they are safe, but that was two days ago who knows where they are right now. the baptist seminary where they did a lot of ministry is helping hundreds of refugees daily.

i just can't get my head around it now that the powder keg has been lit. this week i was able to stream a couple of interviews where mid-east history and current events were the topic. much is to be understood about the Shiites and Sunni muslims, Israel and Iran, and the way it works in Lebanon. what is clear to me is that this is about fundamentalism and this is why there are no easy or quick answers. it cannot be reduced to cowboy politics - "just git rid of the bad guys" which is what our current administration adheres to. if there was no longer Hezbollah there'd be somebody else to fill that role, probably more fervent and more virulent.
other things that were explained in this interviews were:

- Shi'ite Muslims are minority in Islam, however they see themselves as the most faithful true observers of Islam. this compels them to eradicate Israel and all moderate factions of the Islam - in otherwords the Sunnis. this explains the violence in Iraq because prior to the war the Sunnis, which Saddam Hussein was one, were in power. so it is the Sunnis who don't want the US forces to leave Iraq to protect them from violence of the Shiites. incidentally, there are now 100 people dying in Baghdad daily due to Shiite and Sunni insurgence.

- Hezbollah is the resistance organization that is based in southern Lebanon. they are all Shi'ite Muslims who have adopted the teaching/philosophy of the strict Iranian leader Ayatollah Khohmeini. Iran is one of the only countries where the Shi'ites are the majority which is why it is a religious state. in the 80's Shi'ites in southern Lebanon began to rally around the extremist teaching of Iran after the PLO began to loose its grip in the region. this was the birth of Hezbollah - the PLO was a political organization. Hezbollah is fundamentalist group.

- in Lebanon, the population is mostly Sunnis, Shiites and Marionite christians. the majority of the Shi'ite live in south. over the last twenty years especially in the wake of the Lebanese civil war, Hezbollah has become THE infrastructure of southern Lebanon. they run the schools, hospitals and other civic organizations in southern Lebanon. Hezbollah is an independent militia who has stationed themselves along the boarder of Israel. Lebanon is a democracy, but there is much speculation as to the government's ability to enforce policy AND control or reign Hezbollah in.

- Israel feels absolutely justified in bombing civilian targets, because all Hezbollah strongholds are embedded within neighborhoods, hospitals, and densely populated apartment complexes. It seems clear that Hezbollah uses civilians and civilian life as a sheild or human barracade.

Jody said when she was there two weeks ago that she'd never seen a country so "white for harvest." beyond the kingdom level of this conflict what about the human level? in a week's time not just a city, but half of a nation has been leveled. to my deep sadness the evangelical fundamentalist on this side of the pond are almost giddy. it seems the predominant attitude is "yeah, its the end-times." our administration is not too much better saying Israel has a right to defend itself and if Lebanon wants to get Israel off its back they should deal with Hezbollah operating within their borders.

in my last post i think i spoke too soon. i was frustrated with the "big bully" portrayal of Israel in the media. well, after week of this it seems pretty clear that the force that has been unleashed has been disproportionate. i know that little Israel feels quite out numbered in a sea of arab states that vow to push them into the Medditeranian. since day one of their inception they have prepared their people for defending their boarders. as i said before i'm getting lots of emails from within Israel. some are about the daily experiences of the people there, some about the Israeli casualties being sustained and others are doggedly justifying Israel's right to use such force. the latter is what it seems the fundamentalist evangelical flank is clinging to. but, what about mercy? i'm not trying to take sides. i'm really not. but, i refuse to rejoice in any of this. doesn't it say somewhere "in the midst of judgment remember mercy?" i'm not silly enough to say i know the mind of God and to say these are His judgments. but, we who have been spared by grace should be crying out for mercy shouldn't we?

i know i lot of stuff is supposed to come down as the truths of the scriptures unfold in real time. but, how we posture ourselves as they do is what is most critical. in all i've heard this week a letter to the editor was the only thing that made any sense to me. it was written by dean at the Baptist seminary Jody stayed two weeks ago to refute an article written in Christianity Today about this military action. the dean, Martin Accad, came to the states to speak at Fuller Seminary and now finds himself stranded - unable to return since there is no more airport in Lebanon. this quote is his concluding statement. he writes:

"I am angry at self-centered Hezbollah, which has done the inadmissible of taking a unilateral war decision without consulting the Lebanese government of which it is part, never giving a second thought to the hundreds (perhaps thousands) of Lebanese who will perish as a result of its selfish decision. I am angry that citizens of a nation like Israel, who have so suffered at the hands of others, would allow themselves such an out-of-proportion reaction, oh-so-far from the "eye-for-an-eye and tooth-for-a-tooth" principle that we might have forgiven them. I am just as angry at —I have lost hope in —the international community that is keeping silent and not even budging with an official condemnation of this senseless instinct of extermination. By both sides, I would be lynched for what I have just said, if they had the chance. But what have I got to lose anymore?" - Martin Accad

Another Point of View: Evangelical Blindness on Lebanon The academic dean of the Arab Baptist Theological Seminary is angry at evangelical Christians, Israel, Hezbollah, the U.S., and the international community.

posted by kt @ 7/22/2006 10:40:00 PM